Friday, May 4, 2012

Richard
Stolarski (Emeritus Scientist, NASA/GSFC) gave a historic account of ozone
research in the past century and how its continued understanding led to
avoiding one of the biggest global climate-health risks in today’s world. Yes, indeed,
we are talking about the “Ozone Hole”. Richard started off by reviewing early
research by pioneers such as Sydney Chapman who was the first to show the
underpinnings of the chemistry of ozone formation in the stratosphere. This
important discovery enthused the scientific community to further understand the
regeneration and removal of ozone via fast chemical reactions and also led to
first measurements of ozone in the ultraviolet. Around this time, in the early
1970s, Richard got involved in a NASA project to study the possible
environmental effects of space shuttle operations, which was one of the
earliest works hinting on the destruction of ozone by humans. Also, during this
time, long-term ground-based measurements in the remote Antarctic showed first
signs of what we now know as the Ozone Hole. Stolarski’s research, in the
1980s, using NASA’s spaceborne measurements from TOMS and SBUV instruments
confirmed the widespread thinning of stratospheric ozone. The physical basis of
depletion of ozone by CFCs, provided by Molina-Rowland and Crutzen, led to the
most successful global treaty till date, a.k.a. Montreal Protocol, of phasing
out usage of CFCs and thus avoiding serious future implications. This was an exciting
time for ozone and climate change research, and Stolarski’s contribution was of
critical importance -- Summary by Ritesh Gautam